Opinion
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
4A — Wednesday, December 4, 2019
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EVAN STERN | COLUMN
Why forgiving student loan debt is a bad idea
KAYLA CHINITZ | OP-ED
Credit classism at U-M
Let’s find a better way
W
e all know attending
college in this country
has gotten expensive.
In the last three decades, taking
inflation into account, the average
cost
of
attending
a
four-year
institution in this country has
doubled, while data indicates the
price tag of earning a college degree
rose eight times faster
than wages in that
same timespan.
The result is a
staggering
student
loan crisis that has
burdened
millions
of college graduates
who regularly find
themselves trapped
by tens of thousands
of dollars in debt. The
average
American
household with student loan debt
owes almost $50,000, according
to figures published by personal
finance website NerdWallet, and a
total of $1.6 trillion of debt still has
to be paid back by approximately 43
million borrowers.
With the growth of tuition
consistently
outpacing
that
of
paychecks, Americans are finding
it increasingly difficult to recover
and purchase a home, start a family
and even appreciate the benefits
of a college degree. And given the
popularity of higher education,
this crisis will affect more and
more Americans if a solution is not
quickly found.
Here
at
the
University
of
Michigan, we are fortunate to
have great programs that allow
lower income-earners to receive a
world-class education, regardless of
socioeconomic status. With the Go
Blue Guarantee, in-state students
admitted to the Ann Arbor campus
with a family income of $65,000 or
less can receive free tuition, while
families with an income of up to
$180,000 receive some kind of
financial support.
But sadly, many students are not
as fortunate. Across the nation, a
great number of students are forced
to take out risky loans in order
to graduate from college. Even
here in Ann Arbor, many students
who don’t qualify for the Go Blue
Guarantee encounter difficulties.
After college, graduates are faced
with the challenging task of paying
back this debt.
In order to address this crippling
problem,
many
people
have
pointed to blanket student-loan
debt forgiveness, which would
effectively cancel much (or all) of
the debt that borrowers are still
working to pay back. And with the
2020 presidential election now less
than a year away, many of the more
liberal members of the Democratic
field,
especially
Sen.
Bernie
Sanders, I-Vt., and Sen. Elizabeth
Warren, D-Mass., have gotten on
board with this plan in an
effort to give some relief
to graduates and make
college less costly as a
whole.
While Warren says she
would aim to cancel or
significantly reduce the
debt owed by households
with
income
under
$250,000,
according
to
her
“Affordable
Higher
Education
for All” proposal, Sanders says
he would ambitiously work to
forgive the entire $1.6 trillion
owed by Americans, as his public
education plan states. In order to
gather enough money to pay for
student loan debt cancellation,
both would take revenue from
their controversial “Wealth Tax”
proposals.
On the surface, forgiving student
loan debt may sound attractive.
As marketed by Warren, Sanders
and others, it appears at first as
a compassionate policy move, a
proposal that would assist pained
graduates who are burdened by
debt. But on the whole, blanket
student loan forgiveness would
precipitate a cascade of problems
in our economic and educational
systems.
One of the largest issues with
blanket debt cancellation is the
staggering cost. Like some of
Warren and Sanders’ other plans,
such as “Medicare-for-All,” which
they have expressed unwavering
support for, this proposal carries
a disturbing price tag that will
have a profound effect on all of
us. According to a report sent
to her campaign, Warren’s loan
forgiveness plan would cost well
over $600 billion dollars.
While these candidates and other
politicians promise that only the
wealthy will be taxed, it is inevitable
this cost will spread through
society and impact everybody in
some way. One of the most notable
ways a debt forgiveness program
could leave its mark on society
could be by widening the wealth
gap, especially between white
and black households. “While
eliminating student debt for all
households regardless of income
increases median net worth for
young white and Black households,
white families see a greater benefit
likely due to a higher likelihood of
completing college and graduate
degree programs,” according to
research released by Demos and
the Institute on Assets and Social
Policy in 2015. Since people who
have taken out student loans are
likely already better off financially
and likely have a college degree
and good-paying job, student loan
forgiveness could actually make
them even better off relative to
those who never attended college.
Yet another issue with student
loan
debt
forgiveness
is
the
possibility that it could erode the
high quality of college education
that is so common in American
institutions. According to Forbes
in June, debt cancellation would
ensure that “nobody (would be)
on the hook for the growing costs
of higher education. …” Why
would a college care as much
about maintaining the level of its
programs in a responsible manner
if it knew many of its students were
essentially coming there for free?
Blanket loan forgiveness creates a
broad accountability problem in the
end.
Finally, setting everything else
aside, debt cancellation truly sets
a strikingly bad precedent. If all
graduates with student loans can
suddenly wake up one day with all
of their debt completely gone, what
kind of model does that set for the
future? In a nation with blanket
student loan forgiveness, we may
soon see others who are burdened
by debt from different sources
trying to convince the government
to forgive their loans as well.
Ultimately,
a
student
loan
forgiveness
program
would
systematically
undermine
the
unparalleled
nature
of
our
respected educational system while
directly harming our economy. It
is simple common sense to realize
that instead of working to mitigate
the problems stemming from our
broken student loan system, we
must truly work to revamp this
failing system itself. In the end, that
will revolutionize our system of
higher education here in the United
States much more than blanket
debt forgiveness ever could.
ISABELLE SCHINDLER | COLUMN
Evan Stern can be reached at
erstern@umich.edu.
I
t’s time to change how we
nominate our presidential
candidates.
The path to becoming a
presidential nominee of a major
party is long and convoluted.
The main events of this process
are the individual primaries
and caucuses held by each state.
The most well-known are the
Iowa caucuses and the New
Hampshire
primary,
which
always come first and second,
respectively.
This gives these states an
outsized share in choosing who
will be the nominee. Is it fair
for them to have this power?
Should different, more diverse
states take their place? Or should
we change the whole system?
Though the answers to these
questions are not clear, this is
an important conversation we
should be having.
Julián
Castro,
Democratic
presidential
candidate
and
former secretary of Housing and
Urban Development, contributed
to
the
public
conversation
around changing the nominating
system this week when he called
for a reshuffling of the order of
the Democratic primaries.
Castro
singled
out
Iowa
and New Hampshire, saying
they should no longer be the
first two states to vote since
they are not representative of
Democratic voters nationwide.
Castro indirectly pointed to the
fact that both of these states are
overwhelmingly
white,
Iowa
being 91 percent white and New
Hampshire 94 percent white.
The diversity in these states
falls far behind the U.S. as a
whole, which is estimated to
be only about 60 percent white.
Castro argued that this lack of
diversity devalues the voices that
are integral to the success of the
Democratic Party.
Critics of Castro point to the
fact that South Carolina and
Nevada, whose primaries come
after Iowa and New Hampshire,
are much more diverse. South
Carolina has a large African-
American population and Nevada
a large Latino population.
However,
Castro
argued
Iowa and New Hampshire are
bellwether
states;
campaigns
that do not do well in either will
not be able to make it to South
Carolina or Nevada. He is not
wrong in this regard as the only
time a Democratic nominee
won neither Iowa nor New
Hampshire was 1976.
For Castro, these comments
are
largely
political.
His
campaign has been struggling,
as he has had to cut back on
staff and did not qualify for the
November
debate.
However,
his comments have merit. The
system that we use to nominate
a
presidential
candidate
is
extremely complicated and not
very democratic. The question:
How can we fix it?
The fact that Iowa and New
Hampshire have so much power
is unfair. As Castro pointed out,
if a candidate does not do well
in those states, they will usually
have to close up shop. That
means states that come later
in the primary schedule do not
have as many options or as big of
a say in choosing who represents
the Democrats.
However, all Castro is calling
for is having a more diverse
state go first the primaries. This
will not address the problem
of certain states having more
power than others, since it will
simply substitute one inequality
for another.
One of the most obvious
answers would be to have every
state vote on the same day in
a national primary. Like any
system, this has its own set of
pros and cons. A national primary
could significantly reduce the
duration of the election and
would equally distribute voting
power among the states.
However, this process would
come with its own drawbacks.
State by state primaries allow
politicians with little money or
name recognition to gain voter
support
through
intensive,
on-the-ground
campaigning,
such as town halls, canvassing
and other grassroots actions.
This was true in 2008 when
Barack Obama was able to
beat Hillary Clinton in Iowa,
despite
her
greater
name
recognition. If there were a
national primary, it is likely
that people with the most name
recognition would win or that
a large number of candidates
would split the field, allowing
a
candidate
lacking
broad
popular support to win.
There are a few other
solutions
that
could
be
implemented.
One
possible
option would be to divide the
country up into five sets of
ten states and do a rotating
primary
schedule
so
that
every U.S. state could be part
of the first block at least once
every 20 years.
However, this would be
complicated
to
implement
and still runs into the issue
of
discriminating
against
small campaigns that may be
unable to compete in 10 states
at once. Such a process might
also be confusing to voters.
Democracy is often messy,
and the nominee selection
process is no exception. I don’t
know what the right answer is,
and I’m not sure anyone else
does either. However, this is
a conversation we should be
having. Maybe, from those
conversations, we can come up
with a better way to pick our
presidential nominees.
Isabelle Schindler can be reached
at ischind@umich.edu.
W
e’ve all been there.
Watching
the
number of available
seats drop for a course you
desperately want to take crushes
your soul a little. But for some
students this stress eases as
they advance in class rank; for
others, it is ongoing. Currently,
the University of Michigan’s
policy on assigning enrollment
appointment gives students from
better-resourced high schools
preferential treatment at an
institutional level.
U-M
assigns
enrollment
appointments
based
on
Credits Toward Program. The
more credits you have, the
earlier you can secure your
spot in a course. Therefore,
students who come to college
having
already
received
Advanced
Placement
or
International
Baccalaureate
scores set by U-M will enroll
first
among
their
class
throughout
their
college
career, while those at the back
of the line will continue to be
pushed out of their desired
courses. The repercussions
of this issue impact computer
science students particularly
strongly,
where
lower
registration priority means
ending up on long waitlists
for courses they want to take
or even need to complete
their degrees.
If every high school student
had equal access to AP and
IB
courses,
then
perhaps
a
system
of
credit-based
enrollment times would grant
equality of opportunity to all
U-M students. In U.S. public
schools, however, that is not
the case; resource inequality
manifests
along
racial,
economic
and
geographic
lines.
Let’s back up. AP courses
cost money — a lot of money.
The College Board estimates
it
costs
schools
between
$1,900 and $11,650 to start
one new AP course. On top
of these expenses, running
a new class means paying
another teacher. In cities like
Detroit, where money is in
“short supply in city schools
that have spent much of the
recent decades fending off
one crisis after another,” such
cumulative costs frequently
diminish the feasibility of
offering AP and IB courses.
Since the amount of money
a school receives depends
substantially
on
property
taxes
from
its
district,
wealthy schools in wealthy
neighborhoods
often
have
more money to spend on AP
and IB courses. Accordingly,
students from higher-income
communities are more likely
to take AP courses than
students from lower-income
communities.
These disparities are also
prominent along racial lines.
According to a ProPublica
report, white students are 1.8
times more likely to take AP
classes than Black students
nationwide.
In
Michigan
specifically,
that
number
jumps to 2.6 percent. U.S.
Department
of
Education
research
backs
up
trends
demonstrated by this data.
In 2014, Black and Latino
students made up 37 percent
of high school students, but
only 18 percent of students
who pass AP exams with a
qualifying score of 3 or above.
There is also geographic
inequity in AP test completion.
A 2017 report explains rural
schools also face challenges
of overcrowding and limited
resources, and these resource
constraints are reflected in
accessibility of AP courses
nationwide.
In
2015,
73
percent of seniors in rural
high
schools
had
access
to at least one AP course,
compared to 95 percent of
seniors
in
suburban
high
schools. Rural schools are
often
overlooked
because
they are more isolated than
urban and suburban schools,
but one-fifth of public school
students in the U.S. attend a
rural school. That’s a sizable
accessibility
issue.
While
access to higher-level courses
in rural schools has increased
over
recent
years,
that
22-percent gap is still very
real and very wide.
In putting forth these stats,
I do not intend to paint over
any community with a wide
brush — each community has
its own complexities that
influence how its schools
operate. But I do want to draw
attention to inequalities that
reverberate in our enrollment
time assignments. I want to
highlight those connections
because, through its CTP-
based system of enrollment
appointment
assignment,
U-M
is
perpetuating
socioeconomic
inequities
in
the
education
system.
A
system
that
privileges
students with access to AP
and IB courses is a system
that privileges students from
affluent schools.
For
a
university
that
invests heavily in Diversity,
Equity
and
Inclusion
initiatives
and
seems
determined to portray itself
as equitable, it is shocking
that
this
structural
bias
against
students
from
lower-income
and
rural
communities
is
built
into its system of course
registration.
In
renewing
patterns of privilege, U-M
is sending a message about
which students it values.
But let’s be clear, it’s not
just U-M. If you research the
registration
time
systems
of large universities, you’ll
find
that
many
of
them
have similar structures. So
if our system is inherently
unfair,
what’s
a
better
alternative? Let’s look at
Boston
University.
Each
semester, BU randomizes a
list of numbers 0 through 9,
and registration start times
are assigned (within each
class year) based where the
last digit of a student’s ID
number falls on that list. The
key idea here is that BU’s
system of enrollment time
assignment is randomized.
It isn’t systematically biased
toward any one student over
another. If a student gets an
early enrollment slot two
semesters in a row, it’s by
chance.
AP and IB courses provide
fruitful, valuable learning
experiences for high school
students; however, we should
not be basing our system
of course enrollment on a
system that is inherently
unequal,
classist
and
continuously puts students
from affluent communities
at the front of the line.
Kayla Chinitz is a junior in LSA
and the School of Education.
Students from
higher-income
communities are
more likely to take
AP courses
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EVAN
STERN
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